David Janowski
Number of games in database: 844
Years covered: 1891 to 1926
Overall record: +375 -282 =175 (55.6%)*
* Overall winning percentage = (wins+draws/2) / total games
Based on games in the database; may be incomplete.
12 exhibition games, odds games, etc. are excluded from this statistic.

David Markelowicz Janowski was born in 1868 in Wolkowysk, Poland, but soon relocated to France. His chess career began in Paris when he won the city championship, and in the late 1890's he started recieving a steady stream of invitations to international events. He finished in third place in the Vienna tournament of 1898 and second at London the following year. For the next twenty years he was a consistent participant in major tournaments, and, backed by Leo Nardus (with support from friend and past challenger Frank James Marshall to the champion) in 1909, he played a ten-game training match with World Champion Emanuel Lasker. He had drawn a shorter exhibition match with Lasker just months before, but in the ten-game match (see Lasker-Janowski (1909) for further details of those 2 matches) he lost by the score of +1 =2 -7. He managed to secure enough financial backing for a Lasker-Janowski World Championship Match (1910) less than two years later, but lost this one also.
The Janowski Indian opening is: 1. d4 f6 2. c4 d6 3. c3 f5.

Born Leo Salomon, he had his surname legally changed to Nardus. Perhaps he did this wrap himself in the cachet of famous Dutch artists such as: Salomon <Leonardus> Verveer,(1813-1876), and Johannes Hubertus <Leonardus> de Haas (1832-1908)?

Nardus was reputably a technically capable artist, and also a proficient swordsman who was an Olympic fencer for Holland (1912).

He painted portraits of several grandmasters, including Emanuel Lasker and Frank Marshall. Some of them are reproduced here:

visayanbraindoctor: <Everett: <theagenbiteofinwit> What you and Dvoretsky say of Botvinnik may be true, but remember that he is the first GM to use the exchange sac as a weapon in all sorts of situations. Petrosian was the most prolific follower, and brilliant extender, of this idea.>

It was Janowski who first did this regularly way back in the 19th century; who first incorporated the positional exchange sac into his arsenal. The Janowski exchange sacs were true long-term sacrifices; wherein he had to properly evaluate the ensuing practical value of his minor piece as compared to the rook of his opponent.

Blanking out Lasker, Alekhine, Steinitz, Pillsbury, and Marshall in games were he did the exchange sac is a totally impressive feat by Janowski! It would mean that he had an accurate sense of the value of a minor piece as compared to a rook; and the courage to actually do the sac.

Yet if one takes a good look at the above two games, Janowski's exchange sac did not really fail. In order to win, Capablanca also did the same thing later on in the game - he 'imitated' Janowski by making his own exchange sac in both games! Thus, it is quite evident that Janowski's sac had adequate compensation; which Capa neutralized by making his own sac. So even these 'failures' are in a sense successes for the positional exchange sac.

At any rate, it is not only Botvinnik or Petrosian or Kasparov who knew about the exchange sac. The pre-WW1 and pre-WW2 top masters were quite aware of it. The studious Botvinnik in fact may even have studied all the above games in close detail, especially the games of Lasker, Capablanca, and Alekhine who were his competitors. Botvinnik was known to thoroughly study all the games of his close competitors.

The above games also show just how well developed positional chess was by the turn of the last century. If some of these games were given in the internet as they are, without the names of the masters involved, even kibitzers with a heavy dose of present-day generation narcissism would probably be wowing them out. <What exchange sacs; this type of game brings chess to a higher level!... Oops! So it was more than a hundred years ago. Well these games may not have been that great after all, as we all know these doddering ancients had such amateurish competitors and had no computers to help them out. (",)>

KingG: No doubt I'll be accused of trolling again, but I find it laughable to compare those Janowski exchange sacrifices to those of the later Soviet players. They almost all either forced, obvious, give sufficient material compensation, or are made for an attack.

Is anyone seriously going to compare them to the exchange sacrifices of Petrosian for example? I'm not going to even both giving examples, as they are so well known, but there are plenty of games collections out there for those who are interested.

If you want a good example of a modern exchange sac during that era, try the famous A Selezniev vs Alekhine, 1921, even though Alekhine immediately went wrong after the sac. I don't know too many other examples though.

keypusher: <Janowski's exchange sacrifices> I spent quite a bit of time on the 1896 example given against Lasker, as you can see from the game page itself.

Obviously the sacrifice is made to break up Black's kingside; it bears no resemblance to Botvinnik's or Petrosian's sacrifices. Also (although the annotators in 1909 loved it) it's unsound.

Here's another example; I leave it to those who can determine such things whether Janowski sacrificed the exchange or was forced to give it up. Anyway, he got a lost game, though eventually he managed to draw.

KingG: <keypusher> Yeah, I was thinking about that game earlier, but I think the similarity with Petrosian's or Botvinnik's is more superficial than real. Usually they sacrificed the exchange to gain control of square, a colour complex, a pawn roller, or some other positional advantage. Staunton's looks more like a sacrifice to open lines towards the opponents's king. Having said that, it is a lot closer to their sacrifices than Janowski's are.

Janowski offered a draw but Keene declined, thinking he had every chance to win. Imagine his consternation when in the diagrammed position Janowski announced mate in 5 moves. Can you find the checkmate?

bengalcat47: I just recently bought the book David Janowski -- Artist of the Chess Board.
It features 64 games and shows Janowski at his finest against many of his contemporaries, including Lasker, Pillsbury, Tarrasch, Schlechter, and Capablanca, to name just a few.

SteinitzLives: A gambler, a dandy, not well educated, a good sized ego, but unlike so many chess players with these same traits, he had talent! No, not world class, but clever enough to get sponsorship for matches against Lasker despite not being in the champions' class.

Janowski made the most of his talent (for chess only), and then regularly threw away tournament winnings money on the roulette wheel, which was known even then to be dramatically in the houses' favor compared to other games.

It would be interesting to see if Tal ever wrote anything about him.

Though of clearly different talent levels, they both loved to attack and they both loved to party. I like to picture the two of them playing speed chess. With Tal raising the stakes while lowering the time control, and Janowski, offering to go closer to the edge by dropping two minutes in return for an extra bishop!

(Janowski is despite his misfortunes in tournaments and matches of unbroken courage. And one has to concede to him that his style is much better than the little success gives reason to believe. The French competitor senses finesses, with which he knows to reach small advantages masterfully. But he seems to lack the ability of being consequent in something (another possibility is: But he seems to somewhat lack the ability of being consequent). Perhaps he is too frightened by complications. At least, he tries too anxiously to avoid lowering his guard. But thereby his attack naturally loses its impact. Every now and then, his strategy leads to success and then the aesthetic impression is strong.)

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